Leicester 20 Bath 15:RICHARD COCKERILL is adamant. Julien Dupuy, scorer of the last-gasp try which took Leicester into the Heineken Cup semi-finals, will still be a Tiger next season. No matter that big French clubs are waving their cheque-books or that the scrum-half hankers to return home.
“He is under contract,” said Leicester’s acting head coach Cockerill. “His girlfriend is a little bit unsettled. She is back in France and if all things were equal he would like to go back there, but we have had some very amicable conversations and we will make it as easy as possible for him to come and go. However, he will be here next year.”
Dupuy is clearly less sure. After describing how, with 14 seconds left on the game clock, he fooled the Bath defence to dart home from 25 metres, the former Biarritz player refused to say whether he was staying or moving to Paris and joining Stade Français or Perpignan.
“I do not want to talk about it,” said the 25-year-old from Perigueux. “It is not the time.”
It is easy to see why Cockerill is so keen to keep a player he regards as “world class”. This season, Dupuy has started 19 games for Leicester – 10 more than the man he understudies, the England scrumhalf Harry Ellis. On Saturday, the Frenchman replaced Ellis after 51 minutes and his arrival added zip to Leicester even before he earned his team-mates a semi-final against Cardiff at the Millennium Stadium next month.
“Julien put some pace on the game,” said Cockerill who was forced to shuffle his backline when Toby Flood failed a fitness test an hour before kick-off.
“Against tired defenders he is one of the best in the world,” added the coach.
According to Cockerill, Dupuy is now repaying Leicester for the work they have put in since signing the scrumhalf on a two-year deal last summer.
However it was his instinct to wheel away from a defence that to a man was anticipating an attempted drop kick from Sam Vesty, and then dart in under the post that made the game. Until then, it had been pretty average fare and a nervy quarter-final.
Leicester led in an error-strewn first half with two penalties from Vesty, only to go into the break a point down when Shontayne Hape’s delightful dummy set up Shaun Berne. Butch James made that conversion but the World Cup-wining Springbok missed two easy kicks, including the conversion of Joe Maddock’s try 17 minutes from time, which saw Bath retake the lead when Geordan Murphy’s 22 drop-out was charged down.
Vesty kicked a fifth penalty to level the scores before Bath finally paid for their umpteenth turnover of the afternoon. With Vesty sitting deep at the ruck, everyone waited for the drop kick, only for Dupuy to produce the unexpected.
LEICESTER: Murphy (capt); Hamilton, Hipkiss, Erinle , Tuilagi; Vesty, Ellis (Dupuy 51); Ayerza, Chuter, Castrogiovanni, Deacon (Newby, 48), Kay, Croft, Woods, Pienaar (Crane 46).
BATH: Abendanon (Higgins 75); Maddock, Crockett (Berne 32), Hape, Banahan; James, Claassens; Flatman, Mears, Bell; Harrison, Short (Hooper 55), Beattie, Lipman (capt), Fa’amatuainu (Scaysbrook 66)
Referee: A Lewis (Ireland).
